Stepford Revisited Pt. 01

Walter watched the cartoon video in some awe. It explained, in the cheesiest 1950s-style way possible, how nanobots were injected into a woman's bloodstream, made their way to her brain, and then coated her synapses, changing her impulses and desires.

He looked around the room. A circle of men in matching jackets watched him -- beta-male types mostly, except for their leader, the charismatic Mike, who grinned wolfishly at him as the video continued. Walter's wife stood beside him, looking up aghast at the screen.

"I knew it. I knew there was something fishy about this whole town," whispered his wife, who looked a lot like a young Nicole Kidman. "Bunch of nerds, and their impossibly hot, ridiculously servile, blonde bimbo trophy wives."

"Sshhh, honey, I want to hear this."

"What?"

To an upbeat tune suited to a Disney educational cartoon about modern technology, or one of those guides to staying alive in a nuclear attack by hiding under your classroom desk, the narrator showed how the nanobots gave the woman pleasure when she obeyed her husband, and sparked painful electrical currents when she had bad thoughts, until those neural pathways completely closed off. They also downloaded straight into her cortex plenty of recipes, and tips on housecleaning, to make sure she was a top-notch housewife for her man, willing and subservient.

"I told you, didn't I!" Joanna hissed. "Bad enough that these losers found these stupid wives, but when I figured out who the wives used to be -- CEOs and scientists, giants of industry, leaders in their field --!"

"Honey, please," Walter semi-whined. "Quiet."

The circle of men shuffled a little closer to the pair, as Mike turned to look up at the video he'd undoubtedly watched many times -- at least as many times as there were men in the room.

The narrator was explaining that the women became perfect wives in the bedroom, too. Installed with countless techniques for mind-blowing sex, the wives' brains were taught that their husbands' pleasure translated to their own pleasure. "Plus, gentlemen, inhibitions are a thing of the past with these neuro blockers -- your wife can't wait to have a threesome with you and any other woman. Or man, if you prefer! Blowjobs, anal, bondage, a little abuse ... Whatever she used to object to, she has no objections anymore! If it's what YOU want, then that's what SHE wants too!! Act now, gentlemen -- the Perfect Wife ™ can be yours, today!!"

Mike turned off the cartoon with a remote, and the screen faded to darkness.

"Does that help explain things, Walter?" he said quietly.

Walter's mouth was hanging open slightly.

"I knew it I knew it I knew it," muttered Joanna, looking around at the men again. They didn't look like comical losers any longer -- they had the predatory looks of men who had been kicked around by life, but were through being kicked. "I told you, I tried to warn you, but you wouldn't listen! You didn't want to believe me!"

"Silly ... silly girl," said Mike, in that odd, jerky speech pattern that made him sound like Christopher Walken. "Walter believed you. Walter knew ... all the time."

She turned on her husband, eyes blazing.

"At the Men's Club," he said quickly. "Chet's wife made us the most amazing quiche. Rudy's wife performed sexual favors on him while we all watched. Orville used his wife's mouth as an ATM! She gave singles! I was convinced."

"But you didn't say anything? To them, to me? You know this is wrong, sweetheart, you've got to see that." Joanna was starting to feel desperate, the direness of the situation finally sinking in. "You just let me think I was crazy, no matter what I saw ... and holy shit, Bobbie! What your idiot friend Dave did to Bobbie? How could he do that to his own wife? One day a slovenly, strong-minded, foul-mouthed author, and the next day a simpering blonde with an immaculate house who's a dynamo in the kitchen and OK never mind I can hear it now. I get it."

Walter held up a silencing hand to his pretty wife -- calmly, but still something he'd never done before. He turned to Mike. "You can really do this?"

"We have done it ... dozens of times. I gotta say, we're ... getting pretty good at it." The older man pressed a button on his remote, and a hole began to open in the middle of the floor. "My name isn't really Mike, it's a nickname. Because I used to work for Microsoft."

"I worked for IBM for years," said Stu.

"Apple," said another man. "Disney," said another. "AOL." "NASA." "Mattel."

A platform was now rising out of the floor, like a slab in a morgue or a tomb -- complete with the form of a body on top, under a sheet.

"Between us men, we know everything there is to ... know," said Mike, "about robotics, computer programming, microtechnology ..."

"But what do you know about cooking? Cleaning? Caring for children?" spat Joanna.

"Everything can be looked up on the internet." Mike smiled as he stepped forward. All the other men took a step forward too, and Joanna moved closer to the center, to the slab. "Our wives have wireless access 24/7 to the best that all of collected humanity has to offer."

"And what about a woman's hopes and dreams? Her bodily autonomy? Independent thought?" Joanna pleaded. "You can't find that on the internet. Quite the opposite, in my experience. What about a woman's soul??"

Mike made a gesture, waving all that away. "Irrelevant."

The rising platform came level with the floor with a soft click.

"Walter, say something!!"

He pointed at the slab. " ... What's under the sheet?"

"Walter!"

He seemed detached, like he was taking an intellectual interest. "I thought it was nanobots, but with flesh-and-blood bodies. Are they robots, then?"

"It's some of ... both, really," Mike explained calmly as he walked toward the motionless body. "Step one is the nanobots, adjusting your wife's ... basic programming. This is step two." He pulled off the sheet, revealing a clear plastic shell in the shape of a woman.

"Once encased in the shell, she'll become more ... than human. Over time, the shell's biocomponents seep into her skin, changing her on a molecular level. Changing her hair, her shape, her ... breast size. Making her more programmable, with one of these." He held up the remote. "She'll have increased strength and ... stamina, to serve your needs in the bedroom, and everywhere else. She'll have super speed, to get all the chores done. And the syntheskin doesn't show bruises, if ... that's your kind of thing."

Joanna gasped.

"That process takes months, but eventually, they are more robot than human. But still with their human, but uh, upgraded, brain."

"Walter, why in the hell are you still listening to this?? We have to get out of here!"

"Shut up!" he shouted, rounding on her. She drew back, stunned. "Shut up! Goddammit, you never stop talking. Shut UP!!" Outraged, she moved to slap him, or claw his face with her nails. He grabbed her by the wrist, and, while she struggled, he looked at Mike. "You can really do all this?"

"We really can, and we really have. Look around you, Walter. The town of Stepford is filled with happy, satisfied clients."

"Only half the people in this town are happy!" wailed Joanna, her voice breaking. "What about the Stepford wives?"

"I assure you, the ... wives are even happier than we are. Anyway, they ... the wives don't count as clients, or people." He smiled, a chilling smile. "They're the product."

Dave stepped forward, and the other men did the same, drawing the circle ever closer. Joanna whimpered. "Listen, buddy, we've all been in your shoes. We all made the mistake of marrying strong-minded, independent career women. And we were miserable."

"We had to stand in their shadow while they made the choices," said Stu, "while they made the money and got the fame."

"Bossing us around! Not letting us be the man of the house!" said one man.

"Mine used to use a strap-on on me ..." whispered another.

There was a pause, while the others looked at him. He looked embarrassed. "Well, it wasn't all bad ..."

"It's time to choose, Walter," said Mike. But it wasn't, not really. Walter had decided long ago.

He tugged Joanna by the wrist, pulling her to the platform. She barely struggled. Where could she go? And if her own husband wanted this, who could she turn to?

Mike pressed a button on his remote, and a section of the floor began to descend, with Walter and Joanna standing on it. "See you in a bit, fellas," said Walter, smiling up at them as he disappeared from sight.

"You'll find a ... syringe down there," Mike called. "You'll know what to do."

The floor closed above them, and the couple were in darkness for a moment. Then, as the platform touched the floor below with a click, lights flickered on. They could see rows of computer banks. Displays for each of the converted wives. And a small workbench, with a waiting syringe full of nanobots.

"OK, honey," said Walter. "Here's the plan. You're going to have to pretend to be a Perfect Wife ™ for a few days until we can get out of here. Maybe we can sneak out of town, maybe we'll have to do something big, like sabotaging the ball that's coming up in a few days. I don't know. But we have to make a break for it as soon as we can."

"Jesus Christ!" She smacked his arm. "I was so scared, I thought for sure you were going along with this bullshit!"

"Oww! No, of course not, you know I love you for your mind and ... you know, etc. But what was I supposed to do?" He moved among the computer banks, wondering if there was another way out of this basement or lab or whatever it was. There were a lot of dark corners, the lights only extended a short way, but there could be a door somewhere. "We were surrounded. We've been surrounded for weeks. And they have our children!"

"Yeah, OK." She crept after him, keeping her voice down. No way of knowing how much their voices carried to the men upstairs. "Still, you could have tried to let me know what was going on. And you were pretty convincing there. I think you were tempted."

"Oh Jesus," he hissed. "You're a high-powered TV executive! Can you see why I'd get a little tired of being just your husband, and nothing else? Your nameless plus-one at parties? Why I'd want you to be my wife occasionally, instead of me always being your husband?"

"You are the most selfish -- you're impossible, you know that?"

"Me? What do you think it says about you that they thought you and I were perfect candidates for this little robot factory of a town? If you were a better wife -- "

"Men." A voice from the darkness. A woman's voice. Both stopped talking immediately.

The woman stepped into the light, looking like a lobotomized Glenn Close in a Betty Crocker dress and a Dr Horrible smock. Mike's sweet, sweet wife.

"Claire? What are you doing here?"

She smiled at them both.

"Did you really think my husband is so trusting, so foolish, as to send men to convert their wives all by themselves?" Her eyes glittered. "Men are so weak ... And they need help, the dear things. They need to be coaxed to do the right thing. They need a woman's strength, sometimes, or the support of their peers, to do what needs to be done. To do what they really, really want to do, deep down."

She raised a hand, and Joanna noticed for the first time that there was a syringe in it. "Don't you think that's true, my dear? They need our help. And you -- "

Joanna turned to run, but Claire was quick. And Claire was strong. In a moment, the older woman was pinning her to a wall, her forearm clamped in an iron grip.

" -- You need my help too," Claire said, as if she hadn't been interrupted.

Walter raised an ineffectual hand. "Claire, please," he said weakly.

"Don't worry, Walter," she smiled, bringing the syringe to Joanna's arm. "I promise."

She brought her mouth very close to Joanna's ear.

"This will make you both ... very happy."

Joanna felt the needle prick her skin. She threw her head back.

And screamed.